Like many people I have had a security light at my front door for a few years. For the last two years it would come on often ans stay on for for five or ten minutes. So I turned the light off. A few nights ago when it was Halloween, I wanted a light on so the kids could see where they're going. The light wouldn't come on.
So it's time to get a new light.
There was a ten year warranty on this light. My manager keeps all receipts and product information. So the next day she phoned the outlet we bought the light from. For most products, like lights, you take them back to the store and get a new one.
Now starts the runaround. She phoned the store. After a few false starts she finally got to customer service. The Bozo told her the store didn't exchange these lights and she would have to deal with the company. So he gave her a phone number that was wrong. We looked on the product booklet and found a number. Again runaround. You get one person and get put on hold and the line goes dead. Phone back again and somebody acts really dumb. Phone back again and get warranty. They say they don't look after this and you have to go to the technicians. Okay , the technicians say yes they look after warranty. The technician wanted us to put black tape over some eye and try it for a week and if it worked he would send us a gizmo for a permanent fix. If it didn't work, he'd give us a new one.
Then my manager looked at the warranty again and it said , "Take the product back to the store for an exchange." So phone back to the store with the lousy phone system. This time customer service put her through to electrical. The person in electrical said, "Sure, they'd exchange. Just bring it in."
So after a couple of 8 hour days work we finally got our security light exchanged.
The product had a nice fat ten year warranty. I really think the companies work on the theory that the customer will not look at the warranty and when the product quits the customer will go out and buy a new one.
What a runaround!
Have you had similar problems with stores, phone systems or warranties?
